Cats meow for a variety of reasons. Sometimes this relates to their personal needs. But some cats are also just more talkative than others. If you can't identify a specific need that your cat is vocalizing, it may just be socializing with you. Regardless of if your cat is just being friendly, sometimes after a long day, a talkative cat can be a little bit annoying. A good way to address this problem is to train the cat to address its attentions to you differently. This probably will not eliminate meowing, but it may lesson it.

Cats learn most effectivly through posative reinforcement training. This means that yelling at the cat when you are frusterated will probably get you no where, but rewarding the cat for behavior you like will get you ahead by leaps. You can use posative rienforcement to encourage the cat to change to a different way of showing its affection when you are around- for example, by purring.

Lets say that your cat gets very social and talkative in the evenings. It is fed, has a litterbox available, and is well-petted; you don't know why it wants to meow away while you want to read a book. You want the cat to talk to you in a quieter way, by purring.

To do this, start by rewarding your cat when it purrs, and signal why you are rewarding it; you can use a keyword like "good" to do this. You should give the cat a small food treat or significant attention every time it purrs and you say good. The cat will then associate purring with a treat, and the word "good" with a treat. After this has been established, start rewarding the cat with "good" and a treat every time it starts purring in the evening, even if just for a moment. Eventually, you should be able to work your cat around into purring in the evening instead of talking. At this point you don't have to keep giving it treats all the time, except as a reinforcement.

This method requires patience, but it really is one of the better ways to help a cat change a behavior.